EinsteinFest - 2005

Stephen Kern will set the stage for the Miraculous Year with an examination of the general cultural climate surrounding Einsteins eventations of 1905. Taking the fact that Einsteins most important paper begins with a discussion of simultaneity, Kern will consider how a variety of developments in the culture of the period involved a reworking of the experience of time and space, creating new ways of thinking about and experiencing simultaneity.

The achievements of 19th Century physicists stand shoulder to shoulder with those of their 20th Century successors. Physics, per se, did not exist in 1800, but a century later, physics not only existed, but was regarded as the model for all sciences. During the 19th Century, the physics that dominates current introductory textbooks was brought to completion.